


Green is the garden

by SecondStarOnTheLeft



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-28
Updated: 2016-10-28
Packaged: 2018-08-27 14:18:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8404852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SecondStarOnTheLeft/pseuds/SecondStarOnTheLeft
Summary: Lancelot figures it out, and he tells Gwen, and Merlin decides there's no point in pretending that it's not true.
Married. It almost doesn't seem real.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sprayofstars](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sprayofstars/gifts).



He does not tell anyone, because he is used to never telling anyone but Gwaine anything, and-

“You’re thinking very noisily for so early in the morning,” Gwaine says, all sleep-growl and a heavy arm falling over Merlin’s chest. “Shut your brain up and come back to sleep.”

Gwaine makes it look easy, already snuffling before Merlin’s rolled back over to face him, so he tries.

_ Married,  _ he thinks, and knowing that Gwaine will be here in the morning means that it’s easy for Merlin, too.

 

* * *

(Lancelot sees it first.

They’ve always been affectionate, always closer to one another than to anyone else, but this is new. There’s something unusually casual in the way Gwaine wraps his arm over Merlin’s shoulders and then takes half of Arthur’s armour, something oddly  _ intimate  _ in the way Merlin leans over Gwaine’s shoulder with a half-smile and a whisper as he refreshes their cups at table. It’s peculiar, and Lancelot can’t quite understand what it  _ is  _ until he sees the way Gwaine’s face twists and hollows out when Merlin’s little pony rides back into the castle with Merlin slumped forward over its neck.

Gwaine lifts him down gently, cradling Merlin’s head against his shoulder and shifting so that no one can help him, and has Merlin to Gaius before Percival has even returned with Elyan or Leon. 

Lancelot is the first to see, because he  _ knows.  _ He sees it first because Gwen’s suffering makes his chest twist and hollow out, and he wonders how none of them noticed that affection becoming something solid and steadfast.)

 

* * *

Gwen wrangled it from Lancelot, apparently, and asks Merlin over Morgana’s nightgowns and Arthur’s shirts, fresh from the laundresses. He’s surprised by the lack of outrage or disgust in her face, and wonders why he felt he had to hide  _ this. _ It’s not the same as in Ealdor, not the same as his magic - even if it sometimes feels as if this is as much his greatest secret as that.

Men like him were treated… Unkindly, back home. But of course it’s different here. So many things are. He could never have married Gwaine in Ealdor, after all.

“I’m too used to keeping secrets,” he admits, and Gwen’s smile turns to concern, so he grins, wide and silly and sincerely brimming over with happiness, worries bedamned. “I should have known Lancelot would know. He always seems to notice things people try to keep hidden.”

Magic, for one, but Merlin doesn’t know if Lancelot has ever told Gwen that, so he says nothing. Better safe than sorry. 

“We should have a  _ party!”  _ Gwen says, and Merlin almost laughs - a party for Arthur’s manservant! Right!

Except… Gwaine is a knight in the service of the King, one of the highest ranking men in Camelot, companion - however reluctant - to Prince Arthur.

“We probably should,” Merlin admits, already dreading just how many things could go wrong at a party to celebrate his and Gwaine’s wedding. 

Morgause will probably show up.  _ Ugh.  _ And if she’s there, Morgana will be less than likable, and if she’s in that kind of mood-

“Arthur isn’t invited,” Gwen says, light as a moonbeam, and Merlin has never been more grateful for his best friend.

 

* * *

Gwaine is smiling like an enormous sap when Merlin emerges from his room- their room in Gaius’ rooms. Gwaine  _ is _ an enormous sap, and proves it by sweeping Merlin into one of those kisses that feels the same as his magic, when it does good.

“You look very handsome tonight,” Gwaine says. “Going anywhere special?”

Gwaine’s tunic is dark green, and looks wonderful, not that Merlin’s going to tell him that.

“I don’t know,” he says thoughtfully, teasingly. “Gwen mentioned going to the tavern-”

“Imagine how pissed off the Crown Fart will be if you’ve  _ actually  _ been in a tavern, come morning,” Gwaine sighs. “I almost want to come and watch, but then he’d be angry with  _ me _ for not training-”

“Shut up,” Merlin suggests, and leans up that little stretch between them to kiss Gwaine quiet.

It works, more or less, and they manage to get out of Gaius’ rooms without further incident. 

Gwaine’s hand is much bigger than Merlin’s, and calloused all differently, but it’s warm and solid, and Gwaine is holding on even tighter than he is. He hasn’t felt this happy in…  _ Ever,  _ really, and he dreads what Kilgarrah will say when next the dragon calls him. 

Even Gaius has been snubbing him, offended that he wasn’t invited and worried at the recklessness of it - as one of the King’s men, Gwaine technically needs Uther’s permission to marry, but Arthur’s would do.

Oh, well. What they don’t know can’t hurt them, and that’s what Merlin’s planning on telling the others, when eventually they get as far as this party of Gwen’s.

This is theirs, has been just theirs for months now, and while Merlin doesn’t mind sharing with his friends, Arthur is not that. Grand intertwined destinies or not. 

 

* * *

Gwen has set up a party in a pocket of forgotten garden, the walls covered in heavy trellises of peonies and amaryllis and something white and frothy that Merlin, for all his expertise, doesn’t recognise. The sweetness of the snowy flowers is undercut by the sharp bite of rosemary, which surprises him until he remembers what rosemary signifies -  _ fidelity-in-love. _

“It’s a marriage garden,” Gwen says quietly, as Leon and Lancelot and Percival and Elyan crowd around Gwaine to offer congratulations. “I’ve no idea when it was planted, but it’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

Marriage gardens are an old, stamped-out tradition, too tied to the old religion for Uther to allow their continuation - Merlin wonders if maybe Gwen does know all his secrets, for her to choose somewhere like this, for him.

“It is,” he says, and Gwaine is laughing, lit from all sides by candles and the moon, a shock of warmth in the cool softness of the garden. “I feel so lucky.”

For now, he is lucky, and he doesn’t let himself think beyond that.


End file.
